USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina, from its first European discovery to its erection into a republic: with a supplementary chronicle of events to the present time > Part 7
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But Craven proved himself equal to the emergency. He proclaimed martial law, laid an embargo on all ships to prevent either men or provisions from leaving the col- ony, seized upon arms and ammunition wherever they were to be found, and armed a force of trusty negroes to co-operate with the white militia. With twelve hundred men, he marched to meet the enemy. The Indians, mean- while, continued to advance, plundering and murdering without mercy as they came. Thomas Barker, a captain of militia, with a small force, encountered them, and was slain with many of his men. At Goose Creek, a troop of four hundred surrounded a little stockade which contained seventy white men and forty negroes. These maintained
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themselves for awhile, but listening imprudently to over- tures of peace, they admitted the savages within their defences, and were all butchered. In this manner, in a desultory march, they traversed the country around the capital, until the approach of governor Craven compelled their scattered bands to fall back upon their great camp upon the Salke-hatchie. Craven advanced with cautious but undeviating footsteps. The fate of the whole prov- ince depended on the success of his arms, and conquest or death were the only alternatives before him. Fortu- nately for the Carolinians, they had long been accustomed to the Indian modes of warfare. Its strange cries, and sudden terrors, did not appall them. The war-whoop had become a familiar sound, which they had learned to echo back with defiance; and when the battle joined, adopting the partizan warfare, which the deep thickets and interminable swamps of the country seem to suggest as the most likely to prove successful, they encountered their more numerous foes with confidence and success. The Indians fought with desperation and fury, but were defeated. Driven from their camp, they maintained a fly- ing warfare, but found the Carolinians as inveterate in the pursuit as they had been valiant in the conflict. Craven kept his men close at the heels of the enemy, until, step by step, they were expelled from the country, and escaped only by throwing the Savannah between them- selves and their foes. They found shelter in the walls of St. Augustine, and for a time, until they grew troublesome, were treated there with sympathy and indulgence. Ex- pelled from the allies whom they could no longer serve, their future abodes were found in the everglades of the
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Seminoles, of which people they are conjectured, with sufficient plausibility, to be the ancestors. In this in- surrection, Carolina gained a vast accession of valuable territory, but lost no fewer than four hundred inhabitants.
Craven was-succeeded in his short but brilliant admin- istration, by Robert Johnson, a son of Sir Nathaniel John- son, who had formerly held the same office. He found the Carolinians suffering from the vast debts accumulated by their recent wars, the invasion of the province by the In- dians and Spaniards, and the destruction of their commerce by the pirates. To relieve them from this last annoyance, having no vessels of war of their own, application was made to the king of England, George of Hanover, who issued a proclamation, offering pardon to all pirates who should surrender themselves within twelve months. At the same time a force was ordered to sea for their sup- pression. As the island of Providence had long been their harboring place, captain Woods Rogers with a few ships of war, took possession of it for the crown. All the pirates on the island, with the exception of one Vane, and about ninety men who escaped in a sloop, surrendered themselves under the proclamation of the king. Vane fled to North Carolina, and distinguished himself soon after by the capture of two merchant ships of Charlestown. Two pirate sloops, commanded by Steed Bonnet and Richard Worley, found refuge in Cape Fear river, whence they issued on their depredations. Against these, colonel William Rhett, the same gentleman who had dis- tinguished himself in the French invasion, was sent in a single ship. Rhett soon discovered Bonnett, pursued and captured him. Governor Johnson himself embarked
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soon after this achievement, and captured the sloop of Worley after a desperate conflict. The pirates fought with the fury of doomed men, and were all killed or wounded. The wounded men were tried and instantly executed, to anticipate the more honorable death which was threatened by their wounds. Bonnet and his crew were also tried, and all, except one man, were hung and buried on White Point, below high-water mark. Johnson increased his popularity by this display of valor. Other achievements of the same kind followed these, and the coast of Carolina was at length cleared of those robbers of the sea, who had fastened themselves upon the infant colony almost from its commencement.
It was during the administration of Johnson that a rev- olution was effected in the colony, by which the people threw off the proprietary government and placed them- selves under that of the crown. It is needless to go into details, to show the causes which moved them to this change. They have already been summed up in former pages, and it is enough, in this place, to say, that the inter- ests of the two parties, not perhaps well understood by either, were never found to assimilate. It would be a miracle, indeed, if a colony governed from a distance, should be well governed; and the natural evils incident to such a state of things, were necessarily increased by those peculiar troubles which had harrassed the fortunes of the Carolinians. Repeated wars, frequent invasions, robberies by pirates, and the heavy debts which accrued from these events, had made them ready to ascribe to polit- ical influence abroad, and to the operation of laws in which neither their wishes nor their interests had been consulted
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by the proprietors, the oppressive circumstances against which they had so long struggled. The conflict between the lords and the actual possessors of the soil, grew daily more serious ; and, availing themselves of the presence of the provincial assembly, then in session in Charles- town, the leaders of the people prepared in secret the scheme of a revolution, which proved perfectly success- ful. To these proceedings, governor Johnson, who was a faithful adherent of the proprietors, was an entire stranger until he received a letter, dated November 28th, 1719, and signed by Alexander Skene, George Logan, and William Blakeway, in which they informed him of the general association to throw off the proprietary rule. Against these attempts Johnson struggled earnestly but vainly. A proclamation for dissolving an assembly which he found himself unabled to manage, was torn from the hands of the marshal, he himself was deposed, and colonel James Moore, already known for his military achievements, was made governor in his stead.
A day which had been appointed by Johnson for review- ing the militia, was that chosen by the convention which elected Moore, for the purpose of publicly proclaiming him. The governor having intelligence of this design, ordered colonel Parris, the commander of the militia, to postpone the review. Parris, however, was one of the popular party, and Johnson was surprised, on the day ap- pointed, to find the militia drawn up in the market place, drums beating, and colors flying on forts and shipping. Exasperated beyond prudence at this defiance of his au- thority, he advanced upon Parris as if to assault him ; but the colonel ordered his men to present and fire if he ad-
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vanced a step nearer. Johnson found himself utterly unsupported. Moore was declared governor of the prov- ince in the king's name, and the acclamations of the populace, and the unanimity which prevailed among them, sufficiently declared to Johnson his own, and the down- fall of the proprietary government.
One circumstance alone revived his hopes. Having received certain advice that a Spanish fleet of fourteen ships and twelve hundred men had left the Havana, des- tined against South Carolina and the island of Providence, Johnson conceived it a proper time to endeavor to recall the people to a sense of their duty. He wrote to the convention, and strove to reclaim them by showing the danger of military operations under illegal authority ; but the stubborn citizens remained firm in their defection, laughed at his warnings, and, in concert with the governor of their own creation, proceeded to make preparations for their defence. The militia was soon under arms, but the Spanish expedition proved abortive. Repulsed from Providence, and dismantled in a storm, the Spanish fleet was incapable of injury to Carolina.
The arrival of several English armed vessels in the port of Charlestown, suggested other plans to the deposed representative of the lords proprietors. Their command- ers having declared for him, as the magistrate invested with legal authority, he brought up the ships of war in front of the town, and threatened its immediate destruction if the inhabitants any longer withheld their obedience to his authority. But with arms in their hands and forts in their possession, accustomed to conflict, and perhaps rather pleased with its excitements, the Carolinians were not
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to be terrified by the threats of one whose persuasions had failed to pacify them. Their answer of scornful defiance, accompanied by a couple of shot from the forts, convinced Johnson of the hopelessness of his cause ; and finding the people so determined, he drew off his forces and forbore all farther attempts to recover his lost authority. The lords proprietors, at length made aware of the impolicy of any farther struggles in behalf of a plantation which they had managed with reference to their own pride and love of power, rather than to its real wants and the par- ticular circumstances of its condition ; and perhaps wea- ried with the continual opposition of a fiery and head- strong people ; were easily persuaded to dispose of their pecuniary interests to the crown of England. Their po- litical rights, under the charter, had been already declared forfeited. About this time the province was divided into the colonies of South and North Carolina. With the ap- pointment of general Francis Nicholson, as governor of the former colony, begins the royal government of Eng- land over it.
CHAPTER XI.
The change from the proprietary to royal authority, resulted in conferring upon South Carolina increased se- curity and freedom. The form of her government was no longer a speculative plan devised by theoretical writers, but a constitution which had been tested and confirmed by successive ages of experience.
The first object of the royal concern, after the purchase of the colony, was to establish foreign and domestic peace, on the most permanent foundation. Laws were passed, relieving the inhabitants from many of the evils of which they complained, and the treaties of alliance with the Cherokees and other Indian nations were renewed. An embassy, at the head of which was Sir Alexander Cum- ming, explored the Cherokee country in 1730, three hun- dred miles from Charlestown, where he met the principal warriors, and even assisted at the creation of some of their chiefs. Six of these wild inhabitants of the forest returned with him to Charlestown, and accompanied him thence to England, where the king told them, that "he took it kindly that the great nation of Cherokee had sent them so far to brighten the chain of friendship between his and theirs. That chain," he said, "is now like the sun, which shines as well in Britain as upon the great mountains where they live. It equally warms the hearts of Indians and of Englishmen ; and as there is no black- ness on the sun, so neither is there any rust upon the
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chain. He had fastened one end of it to his breast, and he desired them to carry the other end and fasten it to the breast of Moytoy of Telliquo, the great chief, and to the breasts of all their wise men, their captains, and the people,-never more to be broken or unloosed."
The treaty which followed this interview was pro- nounced, by both parties, to be one which should endure while the rivers continued to run, the mountains to stand, and the sun to shine. Skiajagustah, the Cherokee orator, made a reply in the figurative language of his people.
" We are come hither," he said, " from a mountainous place where all is darkness; we are now in a place where all is light. There was one in our country who gave us a yellow token of warlike honor, which is with Moytoy of Telliquo. He came to us like a warrior from you. As warriors we received him. He is a man,-his talk was good,-his memory is among us. We love the great king. We look upon him as the sun. He is our father ; we are his children, Though you are white and we are red, our hearts and hands are joined together. We shall die in this way of thinking. We shall tell our peo- ple what we have seen; our children, from generation to generation, will remember it. In war we shall be one with you. Your enemies shall be ours. Your people and ours shall be one, and shall live together. Your white people may build their houses beside us. We shall not do them hurt, for we are children of one father." He laid down a bunch of eagle's feathers as he added : "These stand for our words ; they are the same to us as letters in a book to you. To your beloved men we de- liver these feathers to stand for all that we have said."
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For twenty years this peace was religiously observed by both parties. Meanwhile, Georgia was formed into a colony, and settled under the government of the celebrated general, Oglethorpe. New influences began to prevail for the benefit of the two colonies. The merchants of Great Britain found their interest in encouraging the trade with the Carolinians ; and the introduction of an immense number of slaves, which enabled them to clear and culti- vate lands which had been hitherto inaccessible to Euro- pean labor, enabled the planters to extend, immeasurably, their credit and resources. The produce of the province, in a few years, was doubled. Forty thousand barrels of rice were exported in 1731, besides deer-skins, furs, naval stores, and provisions. Charlestown contained six hundred buildings ; and constant improvements and daily accessions of population and property began to distin- guish the Ashley river settlement, as one of the most flourishing of all the English colonies in the new world. Nor were the improvements confined to the metropolis. A vast accession of Indian lands, in the interior, encour- aged the settlersrto penetrate even to the Cherokee country.
A colony of Swiss settled on the Savannah, and estab- lished the town of Purrysburgh. Eleven townships were marked out on various rivers : two on the Altamaha, two on Savannah, two on Santee, and one on each of the rivers, Pedee, Black, Waccamaw, and Wateree. Spa- cious churches sprang up, even in the wilderness ; and the providence of the royal proprietor provided ample military stores and arms for the defence of his new and valuable acquisitions.
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The Spaniards maintained an evil eye upon the flour- ishing condition of their ancient enemies, and brooded with anxiety over the long cherished desire to destroy a people whom they still continued to regard as intruders. Their emissaries tampered equally with the Indians and negro slaves of Carolina; and, frequently successful with the former, were at last influential with the latter. The runaways whom they seduced from their masters, were formed into a regiment at St. Augustine; and this fact, once known to their brethren, was too imposing to their imaginations to fail of its effect. They rose in revolt upon the Stono, and having plundered some store- houses of their arms and ammunition, elected a cap- tain, and proceeded, with drums and colors, on their way to the south-west. On their march they massacred the whites without discrimination and compelled the negroes to join their bands. Colonel William Bull, then governor, returning to Charlestown from the southward, met them without having been seen, and quietly rode out of their way. He spread the alarm, which soon reached the presbyterian church at Willtown, where a numerous congregation had assembled. It was, fortunately, the custom among the planters-a custom compelled by law -to carry their arms with them to the place of public worship. Indeed, for the first seventy years of the colony, the Carolinians had felt the necessity of bear- ing arms on all occasions and in all places, whether their purpose was sport, labor, or devotion. Under the command of captain Bee, they sallied forth, leaving the women and children in the church, trembling with appre- hensions. They came upon the negroes while engaged in
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a carousal over some liquors which they had found by the way. They had halted in an open field, singing and dancing in all the barbarous exultation of success. In this condition, to overcome them was an easy task. Di- viding his force into two squads, Bee attacked with one, while the other closed the avenues of escape. Sev- eral were killed ; the rest, dispersed in the woods, en- deavored to steal back to the plantations which they had deserted. The leaders suffered death, while the greater number was received to mercy.
A war which followed between Spain and England, afforded the Carolinians an opportunity for commencing a series of reprisals upon the Spaniards, for the long train of evils which they had suffered at their hands. The great foreign military reputation of general Ogle- thorpe, of the Georgia colony, indicated that gentleman as the proper person to lead the joint forces of the two provinces of Carolina and Georgia against their common enemy. A small European force was sent from Great Britain; companies were furnished by Virginia and North Carolina; the rest of the army was composed of the Georgia militia, and a strong regiment from South Carolina, under the command of colonel Vander- dussen.
After various delays, which have been charged against general Oglethorpe as the true causes of the failure of the expedition, and which certainly enabled the Spaniards to provide against the invaders, he reached St. Augustine ; having, on his way, captured two small forts called Moosa and Diego. His force amounted to two thousand men. But, during his stay at Fort Diego, the garrison at St.
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Augustine had received an accession of strength from six Spanish galleys, armed with long brass nine pounders, and two sloops loaded with provisions. When he sum- moned the fortress, he was answered with defiance. The haughty Don, secure in his strong hold, sent him for an- swer, that he would be happy to shake hands with him within the castle. A bombardment followed this reply, but without effecting any change in the spirit of the de- fenders. The fire was returned from the castle and gal- leys, but little injury was done on either side, and the besiegers found it wiser to consult than to cannonade.
The only hope of Oglethorpe had been to effect his object by surprise. Failing in this, the light weight of his metal, and the ample preparations of the Spaniards against blockade, left him but little prospect of achieving the conquest of so strong a fortress in any other manner. Meantime, the Spanish commander, perceiving that the operations of the besiegers were relaxed, and suspecting their embarrassment, sent out a detachment of three hun- dred men against a small party under colonel Palmer, which lay at Fort Moosa. This commander suffered himself to be surprised, and his men, who were sleeping at the time, were most of them cut in pieces. This dis- aster, in connection with the desertion of the allied Indians, added to the already sufficient reasons which existed for abandoning the expedition. These people, who are not calculated for tedious enterprises, that de- mand patience and afford no opportunities for action, were offended with the haughty humanity of the general. When they brought him the scalp of an enemy, he called them barbarous dogs, rejected the trophy, and bade them
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begone from his sight. They compared this reception with that to which they had hitherto been accustomed, and soon after deserted him.
The siege was raised, and its failure was ascribed by the Carolinians to the deliberate and measured advance of their commander, and to his subsequent timidity in making no bold attempt upon the town. He, on the other hand, declared that he had no confidence in the firmness of the provincials. The truth is, the place was so strongly fortified, well provided and numerously man- ned, that, in all probability, such an attempt must have failed, though conducted by the ablest officers, and exe- cuted by the best disciplined troops.
The mutual recrimination between the parties, which followed this failure, led to many injurious dislikes and misunderstandings. To so great a degree was this dis- like carried on the part of the Carolinians, that, in a sub- sequent period, when Georgia was invaded by a Spanish force, they at first declined sending help to the sister col- ony ; alleging that they could not trust their troops to a commander in whom they had no confidence. At a late hour, indeed, they resolved differently, and despatched three ships to the assistance of the Georgians. The ap- pearance of this tardy force upon the coast, gave a spur to the flight of the invaders. Oglethorpe had already beaten them,-acquitting himself like a good captain and brave man, and fully redeeming the errors, if any, which he had made in the expedition to St. Augustine.
To add to the disasters sustained by Carolina in this un- successful invasion-her losses of men, money and re- pute-a desolating fire, in the same year, (1740) broke out
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in the capital, which consumed one half of the town. Three hundred houses were destroyed, and an immense quantity of goods, provincial commodities and provisions. Twelve years after this event, a hurricane nearly destroy- ed what the fire had spared, and the devoted city was only saved from being utterly swallowed up in the seas, by a providential change of wind. The waters of the Gulf Stream, which had been driven by the blast upon the shores, were permitted to subside into their accustomed channels. In ten minutes after the wind had shifted, the waters fell five feet. But for this, every inhabitant in Charlestown would have perished. Many were drowned,-many more hurt ; the wharves and fortifications were demolished, the provisions in the fields were destroyed, and vast numbers of the cattle perished. The dwellings of the town pre- sented the appearance of one general ruin.
In 1755, the Cherokees renewed their treaty of peace with the Carolinians, and accompanied this act by a ces- sion of a vast portion of territory. This cession, apart from the intrinsic value of the land, was important in another respect, as it served to remove the Indians still farther from the white settlements. Several forts were built by Glen, then governor of Carolina, in the ceded territory. One of these, called Prince George, was situ- ated on the banks of the Savannah, and within gun-shot of an Indian town called Keowee. It contained barracks for an hundred men, was built in the form of a square, had an earthen rampart six feet high, on which stockades were fixed, with a ditch, a natural glacis on two sides, and bastions at the angles, on each of which four small cannon were mounted. On the banks of the same river,
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about one hundred and seventy miles below, another fort was raised, called Fort Moore, in a beautiful and commanding situation. Another, called Loudon, was built on the Tennessee, upwards of five hundred miles from Charlestown. These strong holds were garrisoned by troops from Britain; and the establishment of these defences in the interior, led to the rapid accumulation of settlers in all the choice places in their neighborhood.
In the year 1757, and while William Lyttleton, after- wards lord Westcott, was governor of Carolina, a large party of Cherokee Indians who had been serving in the armies of Great Britain against the French in the west, and had assisted in the conquest of the famous Fort Duquesne, returning from the wars to their homes, took possession of a number of horses belonging to the whites, as they passed through the back parts of Virginia. The Virginians rashly resented the robbery by violence. They killed a number of the warriors, and took several prisoners. This aggression kindled the flames of war among the injured people, who commenced the work of reprisal by scalping the whites wherever they were found. Parties of the young warriors rushed down upon the frontier settlements, and the work of massacre be- came general along the borders of Carolina. The
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